Localism Bill

Baroness Hamwee Excerpts

Thursday 7th July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, the noble Lord and I live in and have represented the same borough; he still does, and although I have not always agreed with him, I very much do so on this occasion.

As to bureaucracy and cost, is he as puzzled as I am about the notion of a list? If you are a member of a local community, you know what its assets are—I use that term broadly. The proposal to set up a list of community assets suggests something much more commercial and directed at people and companies who are not within the local community. Does the noble Lord share that view?

[Lord True]

I certainly have doubts as to whether we need a list of assets of community value and a list of things that are not of community value. We already have a lot of lists and a lot of local knowledge. As I said at the conclusion of my remarks, neighbourhood planning should lead to greater local awareness and involvement. It may be a better mechanism for releasing resources and it would be on a better timescale, because this is, essentially, emergency legislation and you have six months to save it. That is how it all started. Compiling the lists is extremely complex and would relate to any use to which any of the land could be put. It states in the discussion paper that the local authority could consider former or current use, any planning policies, any use for the asset that the nominator is proposing, community support provided by the nominator, any statutory provisions affecting the asset, or any alternative sites in the neighbourhood that could serve the same purpose. I wonder whether some of the people who drafted this Bill would care to volunteer to give their time to some of the local authorities in this country to prepare for and work on those kinds of lists.